A senior commander of Tritya Samelan Prastuti Committee (TSPC), a breakaway faction of CPI-Maoist, along with eight other active members of the banned outfit hiding at Hinom Vihar in Noida, adjoining to Country capital, New Delhi, were arrested by Uttar Pradesh Anti Terrorist Squad.

Security forces have recovered several arms and ammunition and bomb-making items from the arrested.

Police said, the arrested had been staying at Flat No. 102 of B23 in Hindom Apartment in Sector 59 in Noida from the last six to eight months. The arrested posed themselves as property dealers and shopkeepers.

Security-forces have recovered a looted INSAS-rifle, more than 100 gelatin-sticks, detonators and several round of ammunition.

According to police sources all the arrested were once members of CPI-Maoists and with due course of time abandoned the left-wing extremist outfit and joined various criminal groups or factional outfits.

TSPC is in an fratricidal war with the CPI-Maoist for area dominance in border areas of Bihar and Jharkhand. CPI-Maoists makes more than Rs.100 crores through extortion from the region. TSPC is banned by Jharkhand government and has been declared as an internal threat.

A senior police officer from Jharkhand said, “Few of the arrested are trained in making improvised explosive devices and have engaged security forces in various encounters in Bihar and Jharkhand prior abandoning CPI-Maoist.”

Another police officer of the ATS team said that the arrested had accumulated in the city to carry out criminal activities in the city.